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A Hiss from the Bellows

It’s a tribute to the genius of Weston Fulton that the company he founded 100 years ago, based on his inventions, exists today at the edge of the University of Tennessee campus. Despite outdated facilities, constant labor strife and a series of absentee owners, Fulton Bellows continues to generate millions of dollars in sales.

We hear that the new owners, which bought the company out of bankruptcy, will be re-locating to a Knox County industrial park, and the once proud company may be on the verge of a major comeback. The new facility will be more energy efficient and much more productive, and the company should soon move to profitability.

Fulton Bellows, called the “Can Do” company in a Knoxville history compiled by Ed Hooper, was founded in 1904 and has been on Cumberland Avenue since 1917. Of course, the move raises the question of what to do with the huge, rather interesting old brick factory on the banks of Third Creek.

Hearking Parking

We told you recently that the Norfolk Southern lot at Jackson and Gay was an important piece of real estate for the future of downtown residential development and that a condo project announced for the site would most likely “evolve” from the original concept.

Now it appears that the project includes not only the condo development but also a gated and secure surface parking lot available for other downtown residents. The proposal would provide secure parking for upscale residents in condos and apartments on Gay Street.

The lot would seem to be crucial given that the viaduct on Gay Street, over the railroad tracks, is due to be replaced. The on-street parking on the viaduct makes several residential properties viable. The loss of the parking spaces during the reconstruction of the viaduct could put a major crimp into the demand for residences on Gay Street.

Ambassador Welcomes Gore

When former Vice President Al Gore visited Warsaw last week to give a dinner speech sponsored by a local newspaper, he received a courtesy call at his hotel from the U.S. ambassador to Poland. The ambassador also gave Gore a ride to the dinner in his armor-plated BMW, since he was going anyway.

The ambassador, of course, is former Knoxville Mayor Victor Ashe. Ashe and Gore had a bitter campaign against each other for a U.S. Senate seat back in the 1980s. Gore won handily and went on to a national career in politics. Ashe went on to serve as Knoxville’s mayor for 16 years.

After giving the Warsaw speech and picking up his fee, Gore went on to another speaking engagement in St. Petersburg, Russia. The embassy also has visits scheduled this month by Atty. Gen. John Ashcroft, Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy and a host of Knoxvillians, including Joe Sullivan, the MP editor-in-chief, and his wife Mary, taking advantage of Ashe’s remark before leaving Knoxville: “If you’re ever in Warsaw look me up.”

Mail-Order TennCare Test?

Local pharmacists are concerned that a mail-order firm is making inroads into the TennCare patient market. TennCare has received complaints that an out-of-state mail-order pharmaceutical company got names and personal information on TennCare patients, which they fear would be a violation of federal privacy regulations.

Doctors are being called and asked for prescription information on patients (druggists are allowed to do this if they have the patients’ personal information) then the drugs are mailed to the patients and they are asked to sign up for continued delivery.

TennCare responds by saying this was an attempt to try out a program of intensive management for a very small population of the chronically ill, in this case diabetics. Blue Cross has been asked to stop the test. There was no privacy issue because Blue Cross has a right to the information.

At issue are pharmacists’ concerns that this was a trial run and that TennCare will go to mail order drug purchases in order to save money. Pharmacists argue that in some rural areas there is a single drug store and 90 percent of the business is TennCare patients. Mail-order cherry picking could result in elimination of small town drug stores, drying up the network that serves TennCare patients. TennCare has told pharmacists in the past that mail order will not be required without consultation with pharmacists.

A Preservation Demolition!

Some erstwhile preservation-minded types were startled last week when a wrecking crew started whaling away at one of downtown’s oldest buildings, the James Park house at the corner of Cumberland and Walnut, near the post office. The brick house, almost 200 years old, was begun as a residence for Gov. John Sevier, and completed around 1812 by Irish immigrant and onetime mayor Park. It remained the Park residence for about a century. It later served as the headquarters of the Knoxville Academy of Medicine. It was one of only five antebellum buildings downtown. And, as it happens, it still is. When the dust cleared, we learned that the only part being demolished was a large 1960s addition, built of brick roughly to match the antebellum house. It reportedly detracted from the house’s historic value. As the addition fell away, it revealed that the brick rear of the real Park house was still intact, its windows bricked in. Some preservationists like Kim Trent, executive director of Knox Heritage, were actually on hand cheering the demolition on. She remarked that she rarely has that opportunity. The two-story house is being renovated to its original size and appearance by preservationist Linda Claussen; it will eventually serve as the headquarters for the regional freight line, the Gulf & Ohio Railroad, which Linda’s husband Pete Claussen, heads up.

Cas Walker Was Right

Older Knoxvillians may remember when everything suspicious, from desegregation to fluoride in the water supply, was blamed on Ivan—the old newspaper shorthand for “the Soviet Union.” And they may have suffered a moment of deja vu last week. While schools closed for a day and many lesser events were flooded out or scared off, the Tennessee Valley Fair gamely stayed open through Hurricane/Tropical Storm Ivan’s worst—but got little in reward. The fair, which had been ahead of projections through Wednesday, got very little attendance on Thursday and Friday, but did well its closing weekend. In the end, it had drawn 132,000—comparable to last year’s fair, and enough to pay the bills, but about 13,000 less than their goal. PR coordinators blamed it all, finally with some justification, on Ivan.

September 23, 2004 • Vol. 14, No. 39 © 2004 Metro Pulse